Post your Europa Universalis 4 Empire
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To be fair once you have a foothold you don't really need a navy anymore, only to transport as much troops as necessary to defeat them on land and after that you can slowly eat them. Once you get a foothold, it's basically game over for Britain. Nice run though, that sudden big France though...
No, by fully occupying them I could barely get more than 50% WS because of their colonial empire and the fact they blockaded me. That made eating them both painful and slow. I built 50 heavies as I said, which I suicided into their main navy to gain the time needed to cross from Ireland to Scotland in the first war (before getting both sides of the strait in the peacedeal), but I would have needed to build a lot more or to invest in naval ideas to get something close to 100% WS, and there was no need for that campaign. Once I integrated Spain I got a decent navy, but I stopped playing.
Must have happened very early, since the only way you would get animist rebels in that position would be from conquered tribe land (colonized land in CN territory automatically becomes true-faith and primary culture).
My latest and probably last game as Tibet for a while. I've had this idea for a while for a Tibet that Conquers India, but man...India is strong now. I had more success invading China than I did with India. My main goal since the 1600s is to make my faith spread as far as possible. I vassalised Afghanistan, because Afghan ideas make them hell for the Ottomans to invade, which made taking Persia a lot easier. If I were to release Afghanistan, it would probably jump to 5th GP. After taking Persia, I've been slowly clearing up the Russ. Kazakh is 8th GP if I release them as well.
The Philippines and Alaska are both my vassals as well. All credit to Spain for cracking China like a nut. Stopped a resurgent Ming right in its tracks.
The Philippines and Alaska are both my vassals as well. All credit to Spain for cracking China like a nut. Stopped a resurgent Ming right in its tracks.
Kinda proud of the bordergore I've created danceing around alliance webs.
After a few restarts due to Aragon getting some alliance nets that were simply impossible to beat [Things like France; or allying Austria despite rivaling Hungary while also allying half of Italy so defense is impossible] I managed to get a start where Aragon... well... was still allied to Austria [Despite Hungarian rivalry...], but the Ottomans were wiling to support alongside Hungary and Castile.
This, needless to say, got me freedom, although Poland decided to attack Hungary during this. From there I've managed to construct a rather haphazard Naples.
- Venice managed to lose Dalmatia to Bosnia, because they got chainpounded by Ottos and Milan. With Hungary's aid, this was my first expansion as Dalmatia lets me claim on North Italy.
- The next step was taking Venicia itself. While I was at it I vassalised the Knights, and took Crete and gave it to them.
- Reclaimed my cores and took Sardinia
- Mantua killed Ferrara but lacked solid allies so I took Ferrara off them; also took the OPM left of Bosnia because why not
- Finally; pushed Milan somewhat out of Venice.
The result? Ignoreing Malta, I effectively have Naples divided into 5 enclaves I need boats to reach thanks to Pope alliances. Thankfully I broke the worst of em while fighting him and Milan.
Also I might have been able to squeeze a little more expansion out without triggering coalitions but Hungary decided to attack Serbia... while they were guaranteed by Ottos. We managed to win that.
Planning to get the Naples and Italy achievements this run.
Side note: AI AQ is going mad and has managed to save Karaman by allying both Otto and it [Mams allied Karaman too]; and is saving the Mams by blocking any direct border.
Here is my pretty much complete Timurids-Mughal game for Sweet Home Qaraqorum, going for some other goals on the way.
I have completely annexed Ming, unified India and most of Asia, and I finished with a complete victory over the Ottomans.
You may notice that I have a pretty solid pile of money (I could probably keep playing to break my moneycap record by A LOT). It's the first time I accumulate that kind of income that early, especially that insane production income before I have furnaces.
How is that? Well, I rushed for a very specific area of the map very early in the game and decided to make it my capital.
That's the most accessible European area. It basically allowed me to make most of my country into TC for most of the game.
I've built literally all the money-making Trade Company Investments, and all the Manufactories and Counting Houses. Even in wool and grain provinces, they are extremely valuable with the investments boosting production.
I have two states in India giving me more than 20 ducats of monthly income (so just production and tax, not counting the 1000 ducats I collect in Persia).
That's not even an optimal expansion, I don't have Malacca because they are a good ally and I did not bother building a navy. I'm missing on quite a lot of trade income because I lose part of the Chinese trade (I still get quite a lot from the northern route from Beijing to Yumen and Samarkand) and all of the Indochinese one.
Obviously, the other massive use of TCs is to completely bypass the new restriction to territories (TCs are not territories, they don't add corruption).
I have 95 Trade Company Areas, so it's just my last and final war against the Ottomans that started giving me corruption despite my massive Empire (I also took all the possible +States ideas and reforms).
I'm pretty much ignoring overextension. I have Humanist, and the Humanist/Offensive policy giving even less Years of Separatism. I actually did not even know that the Mughals had 10% admin efficiency as a reward for a mission (courtesy of not having been in the forums for a while). That's completely stupid. With Iqta government, Admin, Mughal traditions and Hindvi culture assimilated I core in a year, and with Diplomatic and that 75% admin efficiency I can take stupid amounts of land in a war and I don't have any revolts. I fully annexed Ming in barely 15 years as soon as I got Imperialism by using their tributaries to dodge truces.
That's obviously prime WC material, even despite that stupid corruption (I'm already almost unable to root it, I'd reach the point where you gain corruption faster than you can root it after my next war, that would be against Russia).
I had not had the opportunity to fully experience all the broken features of the last patches, and it's even worst that I thought.
Because I did not want (and could not) expand too fast before uniting TC land and getting Imperialism, and because I started so strong as the Timurids, I also decided to completely avoid building a single merc and to rely on professionalism for once.
With 100% professionalism, basically 100 AT and 125% discipline, I have completely broken quality on top of everything. And I rolled a 6 siege general during that Ottoman war
.
I did a pretty standard Mughals game. I just unified the Persian node to get a powerbase, and rushed to form it asap.
I allied the Ottomans one month into the game, and kept them for 200 years. Besides that, you can see that Biapas is a vassal (transferring trade to me so that I already controlled all of Persian node), and that I used Jaunpur and Malwa to crack India.
I kept the Ottomans just to deter coalitions while I ate India, but I never called them into anything. I've been a good and loyal friend and I had vassals helping them in their wars, so I had accumulated quite the trust before backstabbing them.
I got an early border with Ming but I let them be while I ate India to avoid having outraged countries in too many religious groups before I was strong enough.
Overall that was a very conservative campaign, which also explains my stupidly high amount of money. My primary goal was to abuse TCs and to get filthy rich. The map painting is a necessary consquence.
Europe was extremely interesting:
I don't want to comment too much. It's enough to say pretty much everything here is rare and beautiful. I had literally no impact in that (except maybe Austria eating some of the Ottomans, because they called me in offensive wars twice and I sat idle watching them lose).
You could think that that Prussia is a beautiful thing. They are the only country with more quality than me, and they successfully lead the Protestant League to victory. But as it happens, they fell in a PU under Tuscany which Austria unsuccessfully contested in a climactic war spanning all over Europe where the Ottomans intervened to save Tuscany from Austria and Russia.
Finally, here are the Force Limits. Keep in mind that besides that disloyal Prussia, everyone melts in front of me.
Remind me the downsides of Trade Companies? Lower Force Limit and manpower? Omegalul. If I was using mercs and was willing to go over FL I could run around with 2 million men and I would still make money.
I have completely annexed Ming, unified India and most of Asia, and I finished with a complete victory over the Ottomans.
You may notice that I have a pretty solid pile of money (I could probably keep playing to break my moneycap record by A LOT). It's the first time I accumulate that kind of income that early, especially that insane production income before I have furnaces.
How is that? Well, I rushed for a very specific area of the map very early in the game and decided to make it my capital.
That's the most accessible European area. It basically allowed me to make most of my country into TC for most of the game.
I've built literally all the money-making Trade Company Investments, and all the Manufactories and Counting Houses. Even in wool and grain provinces, they are extremely valuable with the investments boosting production.
I have two states in India giving me more than 20 ducats of monthly income (so just production and tax, not counting the 1000 ducats I collect in Persia).
That's not even an optimal expansion, I don't have Malacca because they are a good ally and I did not bother building a navy. I'm missing on quite a lot of trade income because I lose part of the Chinese trade (I still get quite a lot from the northern route from Beijing to Yumen and Samarkand) and all of the Indochinese one.
Obviously, the other massive use of TCs is to completely bypass the new restriction to territories (TCs are not territories, they don't add corruption).
I have 95 Trade Company Areas, so it's just my last and final war against the Ottomans that started giving me corruption despite my massive Empire (I also took all the possible +States ideas and reforms).
I'm pretty much ignoring overextension. I have Humanist, and the Humanist/Offensive policy giving even less Years of Separatism. I actually did not even know that the Mughals had 10% admin efficiency as a reward for a mission (courtesy of not having been in the forums for a while). That's completely stupid. With Iqta government, Admin, Mughal traditions and Hindvi culture assimilated I core in a year, and with Diplomatic and that 75% admin efficiency I can take stupid amounts of land in a war and I don't have any revolts. I fully annexed Ming in barely 15 years as soon as I got Imperialism by using their tributaries to dodge truces.
That's obviously prime WC material, even despite that stupid corruption (I'm already almost unable to root it, I'd reach the point where you gain corruption faster than you can root it after my next war, that would be against Russia).
I had not had the opportunity to fully experience all the broken features of the last patches, and it's even worst that I thought.
Because I did not want (and could not) expand too fast before uniting TC land and getting Imperialism, and because I started so strong as the Timurids, I also decided to completely avoid building a single merc and to rely on professionalism for once.
With 100% professionalism, basically 100 AT and 125% discipline, I have completely broken quality on top of everything. And I rolled a 6 siege general during that Ottoman war
.I did a pretty standard Mughals game. I just unified the Persian node to get a powerbase, and rushed to form it asap.
I allied the Ottomans one month into the game, and kept them for 200 years. Besides that, you can see that Biapas is a vassal (transferring trade to me so that I already controlled all of Persian node), and that I used Jaunpur and Malwa to crack India.
I kept the Ottomans just to deter coalitions while I ate India, but I never called them into anything. I've been a good and loyal friend and I had vassals helping them in their wars, so I had accumulated quite the trust before backstabbing them.
I got an early border with Ming but I let them be while I ate India to avoid having outraged countries in too many religious groups before I was strong enough.
Overall that was a very conservative campaign, which also explains my stupidly high amount of money. My primary goal was to abuse TCs and to get filthy rich. The map painting is a necessary consquence.
Europe was extremely interesting:
I don't want to comment too much. It's enough to say pretty much everything here is rare and beautiful. I had literally no impact in that (except maybe Austria eating some of the Ottomans, because they called me in offensive wars twice and I sat idle watching them lose).
You could think that that Prussia is a beautiful thing. They are the only country with more quality than me, and they successfully lead the Protestant League to victory. But as it happens, they fell in a PU under Tuscany which Austria unsuccessfully contested in a climactic war spanning all over Europe where the Ottomans intervened to save Tuscany from Austria and Russia.
Finally, here are the Force Limits. Keep in mind that besides that disloyal Prussia, everyone melts in front of me.
Remind me the downsides of Trade Companies? Lower Force Limit and manpower? Omegalul. If I was using mercs and was willing to go over FL I could run around with 2 million men and I would still make money.
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So... a continuation of the Naples run. Things... escalated.
Firstly; I took Monarchist v Statist, because that auto-rerolls your ruler; and I had to take a 1/0/1 lest get PU'ed by Spain, who had my dynasty.
I join up an enclave, make a new enclave, and then Leauge Wars start up. I finish my war, and look at the Leauges. Spain hasn't chosen a side, neither has PLC or France, since they are all at war. Ottomans is on Protestant. I'm Protestant because Popeman excommunicated me.
Que me immediately taking charge and declareing the war and crushing the Catholic side.
And then, only a few MONTHS afterwards, I have to fight France because this happened:
Talk about a role reversal; eh?
Also Spain got the BU so has a big chunk of the Netherlands despite the Dutch revolts. Which means I in effect have that.
It also means in effect, counting my subjects [Knights and Spain; my country currently is split into 9 enclaves. [Venice; Adriatic Coast; South Italy; North Italy; Sardinia; Netherlands; Spain; Siena and the Knights]
And this dosen't get into the CK2 levels of subjects of subjects; because Spain of course has it's colonies. [And since they already have the ideas, they'll still colonize for me]
All of a sudden, stopping at Italy for my ambition looks a little weak. This could go Rome. Maybe. If my patience allows.
Firstly; I took Monarchist v Statist, because that auto-rerolls your ruler; and I had to take a 1/0/1 lest get PU'ed by Spain, who had my dynasty.
I join up an enclave, make a new enclave, and then Leauge Wars start up. I finish my war, and look at the Leauges. Spain hasn't chosen a side, neither has PLC or France, since they are all at war. Ottomans is on Protestant. I'm Protestant because Popeman excommunicated me.
Que me immediately taking charge and declareing the war and crushing the Catholic side.
And then, only a few MONTHS afterwards, I have to fight France because this happened:
Talk about a role reversal; eh?
Also Spain got the BU so has a big chunk of the Netherlands despite the Dutch revolts. Which means I in effect have that.
It also means in effect, counting my subjects [Knights and Spain; my country currently is split into 9 enclaves. [Venice; Adriatic Coast; South Italy; North Italy; Sardinia; Netherlands; Spain; Siena and the Knights]
And this dosen't get into the CK2 levels of subjects of subjects; because Spain of course has it's colonies. [And since they already have the ideas, they'll still colonize for me]
All of a sudden, stopping at Italy for my ambition looks a little weak. This could go Rome. Maybe. If my patience allows.
I went for the Florence achievement "Prince of Egypt", and ended up having a bunch of others too.
Weird how the egyptian flag doesn't fit an italian catholic kingdom but hey...
I made Monténégro my marsh very early on, because I planned to make it eat the Balkans, but I was kinda bored so I chose facility and allied the Ottomans and the Moghols. GB took a PU over the Commonwealth, Russia ate Scandinavia and I saw a unicorn : Hanovre
I had to guarantee this boy.
Here are the success, painful and boring tho :
Since I was bored I tried weird ideas groups (before their rework) and well, they're fun but useless, mostly.
And I was surprised. After a game with Mughals where I had administrative ideas + absolutism, I could conquer all the lands I wanted for cheap price. Now, with Florence / Egypt, with religious ideas only, I had to pay 200 admin points for pretty much every european / north african province. That's painful too.
Weird how the egyptian flag doesn't fit an italian catholic kingdom but hey...
I made Monténégro my marsh very early on, because I planned to make it eat the Balkans, but I was kinda bored so I chose facility and allied the Ottomans and the Moghols. GB took a PU over the Commonwealth, Russia ate Scandinavia and I saw a unicorn : Hanovre
I had to guarantee this boy.
Here are the success, painful and boring tho :
Since I was bored I tried weird ideas groups (before their rework) and well, they're fun but useless, mostly.
And I was surprised. After a game with Mughals where I had administrative ideas + absolutism, I could conquer all the lands I wanted for cheap price. Now, with Florence / Egypt, with religious ideas only, I had to pay 200 admin points for pretty much every european / north african province. That's painful too.
I will soil this thread with a humble ask for a favor. I chose this thread since most of people posting here know the game better than i do. If anyone is interested, i'd appreciate if you would try and declare on France (my goal is to eventually get Auld Alliance Reversed) and tell me how it went. Their army strength and size (and their ally Prussia) really frighten me. So, here it is:
Far from an Empire of course. It was my first game with Scotland, and far too many things went wrong and i made a lot of horrific mistakes. But i think i stabilized well enough to start thinking of attacking them. Tech levels are on par, my ally is Netherlands (71k) and Aragon (60k), but France has Prussia (90k) on their side, so it should be a wild ride. French Canada will be easily overrun by my colonies, and my FL allows me 30 more regiments. Didn't hire any mercs yet though i plan to. France is currently fighting Ming for holdings in East Asia, so i think this is just the moment to try this.
I'd really appreciate if anyone is willing to give it a go and give me some advices on how to approach this war Cheers.
Far from an Empire of course. It was my first game with Scotland, and far too many things went wrong and i made a lot of horrific mistakes. But i think i stabilized well enough to start thinking of attacking them. Tech levels are on par, my ally is Netherlands (71k) and Aragon (60k), but France has Prussia (90k) on their side, so it should be a wild ride. French Canada will be easily overrun by my colonies, and my FL allows me 30 more regiments. Didn't hire any mercs yet though i plan to. France is currently fighting Ming for holdings in East Asia, so i think this is just the moment to try this.
I'd really appreciate if anyone is willing to give it a go and give me some advices on how to approach this war
Cheers.
You'd have more luck creating your own thread to be honest. More people would see it. I'm in too much of a CK2 mood for tonight, but if noone answers I'll have a look tomorrow.
You're right, i'll do that
I'm in no rush, so if you feel like trying it out, tomorrow sounds great.
You only need Empire Rank, right? The glorious People's Republic! Why take when you can build?
@bly08 How did you not collapse with almost 900% OE? I recently went to 300%, and I got 80k+ rebel stacks spawning across my entire realm. With that high OE, surely you must've been getting 200k+ stacks?